Einstein has been adopted!

Great news--

The Clark family from Manhattan Beach has adopted Einstein and he's been with them for several days now. After the first full day they called to say how well he is doing. He is warming up to them much more quickly than any of us had even hoped.

The Clarks have three children, aged 23, 13 and 5. We were worried about the fit with the 5 year old, but she has been wonderful. We explained Einstein's previous negative experience with a child her age, and she took it as her personal mission to show him that not all kids are going to scare him. With patience and some cheddar cheese, she won him over quickly.

We have MANY Shelties who need rescuing, so if you are interested in considering adopting a Sheltie, please click on the link over on the right side of the page. I recently learned that the Sheltie Rescue group often matches up a new dog with a prospective owner waiting in the applicant file and the dog may not even go up on the website. This group places over 300 Shelties a year. It's shocking that so many dogs end up needing to be rescued out of shelters or rehomed. There is nothing wrong with this breed, and in Northern California we didn't have this kind of volume. I think there are some "backyard breeders" producing a lot of dogs in this warmer climate down here. Anyway, we would love to work with you to help match you up with a wonderful Sheltie.

We also need foster homes. If you would consider being a rescue foster home, we would love to hear from you.

Thank you!

Another breakthrough

E has been with us for almost 4 weeks. Usually his morning routine is he wants to be petted but won't come all the way up to me without me telling him to sit and then giving him a treat.

This morning, I could tell he wanted to come up to me, but when I'd turn to him he'd trot away, and trot around the dining room table, coming close to me each time but not explicitly coming up to be petted.

I was in my bathroom getting ready for work, and he came to the door-- again, the "I want to come up to you" vibe. I sat on the edge of the tub and one dog came up for pets. And so did E. No coaxing, no "sit" routine, he just came all the way up to me for a little scratching on his chest. It's a small thing, but a big thing at the same time.

Also, in the mornings he is very playful and wants to engage in play. He tries to get this started by acting all prancy and happy and then barking at me. I don't want the barking part, it's early in the morning and my neighbors will not be OK with that. I immediately turn away from him. If that doesn't stop it, which so far it kinda doesn't, I immediately go into the other room and shut the door, leaving him dumbfounded. After about 10 seconds, I open the door like nothing happened. This interruption of the barking is important. If I had more time to work with this in the morning, I'd wait for the moment when he stopped barking, and would C/T the quiet. The only time we have this barking is when we arrive home and he's greeting us, and when he's trying to play (or when my other dogs are wrestling and playing, and he's trying to join in, so he barks at them happily while they wrestle).

Also this morning, he proactively jumped onto the sofa to have a 20-min snuggle session with my husband. Dennis loved this, because E has been slower to warm up to him and now E is completely comfortable with him.

More bell work and great progress

We moved back to the door leading outside and worked with the bells the same way we've been doing so for the last day... first on the floor, then hanging from my hand. We're not putting them back on the door, YET. Baby steps. Baby steps.

Working with bells in a new room

This morning before work, I took E into a new room and worked with the bells a bit more. Sorry for the dark video, I didn't realize the light in there was so bad. He did very well, despite the presence of the tripod and camera, which he dislikes. Here you go:

Loving the bells

Hmmm. In our first session tonight, E was touching the target dot behind the bells but when he'd also touch the bell, it would jingle and he'd panic and run away from it. Next training session, he was trying hard to avoid that bell. Uh oh. That's not what we want.

I gave him some "easy wins" and ended the session to think about this some more.

Tonight I realized I needed to help him love the bells by taking them off the door, going into a different room, and teaching him to target them while they're on the floor. So I sat down in a quiet room with some GOOD treats, and he expressed concern that the Evil Bells were there. I went slowly. I handled them in such a way that they only made a little noise, put them down on the carpet, and let him smell my hand. See? That's what bells smell like, OK?

We started the targeting exercise, and by now he knows the game and is moving into it quickly. He'd look at them. I'd C/T. Then I went for the gold. I put little pieces of cheese near the bells. He gobbled them up as I clicked. I put one ON the bell. He gingerly took it as I clicked. I took about 6 little pieces of cheese and tucked them around the bells so he'd have to stick his nose right in there to get them, touching the bells with his nose. He was starting to like this.

I could see his attitude changing. We made good progress and I was running out of the cheese so we stopped, I praised and rubbed him down, and went to the kitchen to reload. (He was also getting tiny cat food bits, and small dog kibbles. I save the cheese bit for a high level of performance, like actually touching the bells).

We went back and I put the bells on the ground again. He seemed spooked again, so we backed up-- a C/T for just looking at the bells. After a few of those, he was off and running again, giving me some really good pushes on those bells. His fear of making them jingle seemed gone. He even whacked 'em with his paw once, good and hard. He got a jackpot for that.

I used the relative value of the treats to communicate my level of pleasure with his performance. A touch resulting in a jingle would definately warrant a cheese treat, and maybe more than one depending on the intensity of the hit. A nose-touch to the thick cord would just get a lower value cat-food bit. He was doing very well!

We took another break. I wanted to evolve to holding the cord in my hand, dangling the bells down so they were hanging. I'm starting to emulate the position they have on the doorknob.

Again, he started out concerned, so we backed up a few steps and "warmed up". Again, he progressed quickly. He was consistently nosing them and making them jingle a bit.

Another break.

This time, I moved the bells to my other hand. He didn't like that. But again, after a brief warm up, he was back in the game. By now, the other dogs were losing their patience and starting to scratch on the door and complain. He was getting distracted so I found a good successful touch, and ended the session with lots of praise and scratches.

After the session, I took him out and he immediately relieved himself. When a dog is eating treats like this, especially when combined with the pressure of a few training sessions, it will usually make him have to go. By the way, it's important to make sure you potty your dog before you start a session, too, so you don't have a dog who is distracted because he kinda has to go.

I did "therapy dog work" at Stanford Hospital when I lived it the Bay Area, and a team of us would go in and give dog visits on a floor for about an hour. We would of course "empty" our dogs before going in, so you'd think they'd be fine. Without fail, as soon as we'd leave we'd head for the grass and all the dogs would have to go. And go. And go. Even though they enjoy the therapy dog work, the pressure of it seems to stimulate the other body functions and I think this applies to any kind of training session. So keep that in mind, if your dog's been concentrating and working hard for you, give him a bio break afterward.

We have one family coming to visit E this weekend. We'll see if it's a good match!

Target dot goes near the jingle bells

We moved the target dot yet again, this time to the door where the jingle bells are. We're going to start slowly moving it behind the bells, to get him to bump the bells.

You'll notice that we "back up" in terms of our criteria-- once again, because we're in a new location, the game feels different to him so we C/T for merely looking at the dot, and it progresses quickly from there. We got our first "bell touch" in this sequence. I chopped it up a bit to make it shorter for you-- the entire session was 15 minutes long. The dot is inched up behind the bells over the course of this session.

Target dot goes onto the wall

Here is Einstein about 40 minutes after the previous post, working the same target dot which has now been moved onto the wall. The environment was very distracting, my dogs were barking, the window shade was flapping and making noise, a car was pulling up out front, and my snoozing husband got irritated with my other barking dog and started to scold him, which I interrupted since that would derail Einstein. So in the midst of all that, here's how he did learning for the first time how to touch the target dot while taped onto a wall.

By the way, dogs have to learn how to generalize, and it doesn't come naturally to them. So just because he knows how to touch the dot on the floor doesn't mean he instantly knows how to do it when it's on the wall. That feels really different to him. With the immediate feedback from my clicker (my tongue click) he quickly gets the idea and this also strengthens his "generalization" muscle a bit.

By the way, he really dislikes the tripod and I'm standing right by it. I'm going to leave the tripod out in the living room and other places so he gets used to it and stops being suspicious of it.

Here we go:

Target training in the hallway

I just figured out how to use my camera to do videos. Here's Einstein clicker-training with the target dot (which is the lid from a coffee can). The idea is to start moving the target dot around, and eventually put it on the wall, and then behind the jingle bells, so I can train him ultimately to ring the jingle bells when he needs to go outside.

If you're new to clicker training, here is a really quick video on the basic concepts.


It's a slow but very effective process. We're still in the early stages. But here you can see E working on this for the first time in a hallway. He has never had a training session in this hallway, so it's a bit weird for him, and in addition there's a large tripod holding my camera, and my camera makes a very high-pitched sound when it starts and stops, and he dislikes that. So he is not himself here, and look how willing he still is to work for me. What a love.

God bless YouTube. This file is big and would eat up so much of my hard disk that if it were not for YouTube, you'd never see videos of E. By the way, I'm usually grabbing opportunities for training in the margins of my busy life, and I try to stay out of the film because I've often just gotten out of the shower and have on sweats with dripping wet hair, etc. That's certainly the case in this one. So forgive me for not showing you more of what I'm doing as a trainer. I'll do that once I have more time to clean up a bit for the camera!

The different elements of a behavior

It's helpful to think of any behavior as having the following elements:

Distraction in the environment (birds chirping, traffic noise) or in the dog (stress)
Distance (how far away from you can he be and still obey the command? How far can he carry the tennis ball?)
Duration (how many seconds or minutes can he do it?)
Intensity (how hard does he have to push the jingle bells to get them to ring?)
Speed (how quickly does he perform the behavior?)

When we talk about "raising the bar" on a behavior, the truth is that we've got 5 bars, each with their own range of difficulty. So we have to be careful to only raise the criterion of one bar at a time, and when we do, we temporarily relax our requirements for the other ones. Once the new criterion is solidly established, we then work on getting those other elements back where they were. Generally, we want to shape the element of speed last. We want to get the other stuff right before we ask the dog to speed things up.

These concepts apply to all learning situations, by the way, this is not just about dog training. So if you want to improve your golf swing, work on one aspect of it and give yourself a break on the other elements of it while you're learning the new part.

Studying this stuff is fun, it's fascinating, and its immensely applicable in life.

Day 6: evening- Progress!!!

Wow, what a day. I went outside and created an enclosed training space with 2 ex-pens. We worked on "sit" which took him awhile to get (it's a behavior he usually only offers when he's not sure what you want and he's sort of sitting in submission). I saw the lightbulb go on! Soon we were doing it again and again and again. Hooray! So I moved to a new location, which distracted him a bit but he caught back up again. So we moved to another location, and did it some more. Each time you move to a new location you raise the bar a bit. All locations were in the back yard, all only slightly distracting (distractions included a breeze causing the sun umbrellas to rustle and move, background noises, etc).

So I sensed we were on a roll. At the same time, I didn't want to overwhelm him! It's a big training mistake to go too fast. I wanted to try him on my bike with the K9 Cruiser. I clipped him to the short light tether, and slowly walked the bike around the back yard, encouraging him. He was fine! We went out front, and I tried riding slowly. He was fine! We went around a bit in front of the house, and he was doing great (he goes fast!). On my bike I have a rear-mirror positioned to let me know if the dog is happily going as fast as the bike, or if he's falling back in position a bit. This alerts me before he falls into a position where he'd be pulled at all by the bike. He loved it. We went all the way around the block, with cars passing us and everything. The only hiccup came when a neighbor wanted to say hi to him and even though the man was 12 feet away, he started to pull back and panic. He asked to be held, and I held him and he was fine (but we did not move any closer to the man, I didn't want to undo all our progress to date by overwhelming him). We said goodbye and I clipped him back up and we went on our way. He really impressed me with his progress, and frankly he showed a lot resilience in the presence of huge SUVs passing us. Good boy!

Treats? Mix it up a bit

Training tip: when giving treats, it's better if the dog is not sure exactly which treat is coming. Don't use the same stuff all the time. Make a "trail mix" of treats. My trail mix for E this afternoon consisted of 2 kinds of kibble, tiny bits of cheddar cheese, and tiny bits of Natural Balance (I cut the Natural Balance and the cheese into bits with a large chef's knife and keep it all in a plastic container. Each piece is about the size of a lentil. We're talkin' small! By keeping these treats all together, even the kibble absorbs some of the yummy flavor of the cheese and Natural Balance, giving it a higher value in the eyes of the dog.

In addition, it's best to "mix it up" when it comes to the way you deliver the treat. Sometimes, hand it directly to the dog. Sometimes toss it a few inches to the left. Sometimes toss it a few inches to the right. If your dog is likely to run after it, you can toss it low to the ground but far away, and let the dog chase after it. All of this makes it more interesting for the dog, and adds a variable that keeps them engaged in the game.

When the dog has accomplished something he's been struggling with, or when he does something that I really want him to notice, I give him a "jackpot"-- which could be a whole handful of treats. I save the jackpot to make a big point, because it makes a big impact on the dog.

Day 2

Dennis fed E a bit of kibble in his crate for breakfast, and took him out with our other dogs to eliminate. Back in the crate for a bit.

I got up and took him out again, to the fenced-off dog yard so I could let him offleash there. I walked around a bit to encourage him to go. He didn't need to go again. I went over the clean "safe to sit down" area, and sat on the ground. He hopped around like a colt, clearly wanting to initiate play. He gave a little bark, the first sound we've heard out of him at all. He trotted around the perimeter of the dog-yard, just burning off some steam (not trying to escape). He was clearly happy.

I encouraged him (very softly) to come to me, and slowly reached out and scratched his chest and then took his collar and clipped the leash to it. Again, I took him into my lap for a moment, and he loved it. I stroked him and praised him, and gently put him out of my lap so I could get up. He stopped for a long drink of water, and then back into the house and into the crate.

I confined my dogs so I could train E without the others clammoring for their turn. (Everyone loves a training session in this house). I took E outside to the back yard, where the distraction level is higher than where we've trained so far (2 different rooms in the house). We worked on eye contact again. He is very food motivated, so he loves this game. I was sitting on the ground, holding the plastic bin of treats. He pawed at it and tried to push my hand off the top with his nose. He gently took the rim with his teeth and tried to pull. He finally figured out that he could only get the treats if he earned them. But boy does he want them! There were lots of sounds (people walking by, a squirrel racing across the roof) so it was a big deal for him to keep the game up with all the distraction.

In clicker training, when we "raise the bar" of distraction, we lower the bar of the other criteria (length of time eye contact must be sustained). So in other words, because it was a more distracting spot, he only had to glance at me to earn a treat. Later, we'll make him sustain it for longer.

Back into his crate, and off to work for me. My husband is working from home today so we can ease E into having longer periods of time in the yard.